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BILLINGS, Mont. — <\/span>Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Thursday that the Trump administration remains \u201cfull-bore ahead\u201d with a sweeping reorganization<\/a> of the Forest Service and other agencies after a judge blocked the changes last week.<\/p>\n The administration wants to move Forest Service headquarters from Washington to Salt Lake City, shutter 23 research stations, and close many regional offices and replace them with state offices. It’s part of a broader realignment at the Agriculture Department that also would change programs for food and nutrition, rural development and other services.<\/p>\n For now the plan<\/a> is stalled under court order. But that’s already under appeal, and Rollins made clear Thursday that the administration hasn’t given up.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are full-bore ahead in the reorganization,\u201d Rollins said during a conference call with reporters following an announcement on fertilizer production. \u201cWe believe in it more today than we ever have \u2014 taking the USDA to our constituents, which is rural America, the Forest Service out West.\u201d<\/p>\n Administration officials say the reorganization will trim costs and further concentrate resources in Western states that are home to nearly 90% of national forest lands.<\/p>\n Federal employee unions, environmental groups and local officials, including in California, Maryland and Washington state, are trying to quash the plan. They say the shuffling of employees is a ploy to achieve the administration’s goal of deep cuts in the workforce, by forcing out employees unwilling or unable to relocate.<\/p>\n U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria in California sided with those arguments in an Oct. 13 order halting the reorganization while a lawsuit from opponents works its way through the courts.<\/p>\n \u201cIf implemented, the planned reorganization activities will likely put thousands of USDA employees to the choice of relocating far from their current home \u2014 often to a different state \u2014 or losing their job,\u201d Chhabria wrote. He said the administration \u201calmost certainly\u201d violated congressional restrictions on using money on the reorganization that was intended for other purposes.<\/p>\n The U.S. Department of Agriculture has been eliminating layers of management as part of President Donald Trump\u2019s push to slim down the federal workforce and make it more efficient. <\/p>\n Trump also wants to take away one of the Forest Service’s most prominent roles \u2014 fighting wildfires<\/a> \u2014 and transfer that responsibility to the newly created federal Wildland Fire Service. <\/p>\n Gov. Spencer Cox in Utah \u2014 a state better known for its deserts \u2014 has described the Forest Service reorganization, including a new headquarters in Salt Lake City, as \u201ca big win for Utah and the West.\u201d GOP lawmakers said it would ensure agency officials get more local input before making decisions.<\/p>\n The administration last month scaled back one aspect of its plan and said 41 research facilities across the country that faced possible closure would remain open. Almost two dozen research stations still are slated to close.<\/p>\n The Forest Service workforce has been cut 16% under Trump, from more than 39,000 employees when the Republican began his second term to 33,000 this year, according to government data.<\/p>\n During his first term, Trump moved the Bureau of Land Management to Colorado<\/a>, citing many of the same reasons \u2014 including a desire to put top officials closer to the public lands they oversee. The Biden administration reversed course<\/a>, moving BLM headquarters back to Washington, D.C., after two years. <\/p>\n The National Federation of Federal Employees union said a survey of its members showed a large majority opposed the Agriculture Department reorganization plan and most were unwilling to relocate.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n